Plastic sheet laminates are commonly used in a variety of applications including identification cards, credit cards, bank cards, and the like. Such laminates are generally comprised of a relatively thick core layer containing printed indicia on at least one side thereof, and a relatively thin, transparent layer laminately joined to each side of the core layer. For certain applications, particularly for credit cards, the laminate is embossed and the raised areas are typically printed or tipped with ink.
Heretofore, such laminates have been generally made of plastic sheets comprised of various thermoplastic blends containing primarily polyvinyl chloride homopolymers or copolymers. Previous credit card laminates have properties such as stiffness, impact strength, resilience and flexural durability only sufficient to provide about a one to two-year service life.